Month: September 2016

Ending the Interview Right!

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Jeff Altman, The Big Game Hunter discusses the way to end a job interview and leave a great impression.

[spp-transcript]

Do you think employers are trying to help you? You already know you can’t trust recruiters—they tell as they think you need to know to take the job they after representing so they collect their payday.

The skills needed to find a job are different yet complement the skills needed to do a job.

Jeff Altman, The Big Game Hunter has been a career coach and recruiter for what seems like one hundred years.

JobSearchCoachingHQ.com is there to change that with great advice for job hunters—videos, my books and guides to job hunting, podcasts, articles, PLUS a community for you to ask questions of PLUS the ability to ask me questions where I function as your ally with no conflict of interest answering your questions.

Connect with me on LinkedIn

You Certify Yourself

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Jeff Altman, The Big Game Hunter discusses how we certify ourselves during a job interview as the person to be chosen.

[spp-transcript]

I’ve been part of a nonprofit group that runs men’s retreats around the world. In the course of standing for what is called certification (basically, being authorized by a committee of men who are leading these weekends to have the authority to lead weekends), I’ve been told that the basic idea that you try to have is you certified yourself.

Your matter and your demeanor go along way toward whether or not you will ever be chosen to be hired for an organization. That is true whether I was going for certification of that organization to leave these retreats. That’s true when you are being interviewed for a position.

Does that mean you have to carry yourself as a firm determined individual? No. It’s really about your self-confidence and your certainty in yourself, no matter what your personality is and how it displays itself in the course of the interview.

You have to be an interview clone and parade in like so many other people do with the behavior that’s false or having false arrogance. You just have to that presence and bearing that says, “I’m comfortable in my skin. I know what I know.” You need to be able to look people square in the eye, at times you’re going to smile, at times you may even laugh, a time she may display some discomfort or agony about decisions you’ve made, but you’re comfortable in your own skin as you speak about your experience, your competence and all matters.

When you can do that, it doesn’t really matter if someone chooses you are not. They’ll choose you but when you can certify yourself, when you carry yourself with believing yourself that you are the authority, then, ultimately, you will do so much better on your interviews, do so much better professionally… I want to encourage you – – relax.

You don’t have to act any particular way. You just have to really be yourself and be comfortable in your own skin.

[/spp-transcript]

Do you think employers are trying to help you? You already know you can’t trust recruiters—they tell as they think you need to know to take the job they after representing so they collect their payday.

The skills needed to find a job are different yet complement the skills needed to do a job.

Jeff Altman, The Big Game Hunter has been a career coach and recruiter for what seems like one hundred years.

JobSearchCoachingHQ.com is there to change that with great advice for job hunters—videos, my books and guides to job hunting, podcasts, articles, PLUS a community for you to ask questions of PLUS the ability to ask me questions where I function as your ally with no conflict of interest answering your questions.

Connect with me on LinkedIn

What Do I Do If I Feel Burned Out?

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[svp]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9RCCxQ2Fxg0[/svp]

A common feeling about job hunters is feeling burned out . . . but is that really the right word? I explore that in this video and offer another term for it and suggestions for how to deal with it.

[spp-transcript]

What do I do if I feel burned out? Man this is such a common question. The follow-up part to the question is that the person is one more interview schedule and the individual he is going to meet with has been rude to him up until this point so, obviously, the question was feeling it degree of pessimism about this interview and feeling burnt out.

I’m thinking burned out may not be the right term here. I think frustrated is the right term. It seems he’s feeling frustrated because he hasn’t gotten the results that he thinks he deserves.

So, if you are feeling burned out, if you’re feeling frustrated, if you are doing a lot of stuff and not getting the results that you hoped for, I invite you to put aside these expectations that you deserve a certain type of result in slow things down a little bit.

Often “burn out” is frustration that “if I do these things, I expect certain results NOW.” Unfortunately, life doesn’t work that way.

Would you need to do is reevaluate how your search has been conducted, what are you doing right and what could you be doing differently. Maybe you are in a field that operates differently than your expectation. Maybe you need to adjust to remain in that field.

I hear that someone is feeling frustrated, I encourage people to take a couple of hours to sit back and asked themselves what’s been going on in the search so far? Have you been going “great guns” to launch your search? Have you done anything since to market yourself? Maybe what you need to do is arrange for a few more interviews because, to use this person’s example, they only have one more interview schedule is not feeling particularly optimistic about it.

To get the results that you want, you can’t just simply charge out “great guns.” You need to exert effort that sustains itself over the course of time. You have to be patient until you get the opportunity to kiss the right frog that turns into a prince or princess, you’re going to be kissing a lot of dirty frogs, right?

So, think in terms of you get the right outcome. How do you do that? Generate more interviews. Improve your interviewing, if that’s the issue. If the issue is your field requires you to do certain things that up until this point you have wanted to do, then you have to sit back and say, “okay, what’s the price I’m willing to pay?” After all, is a choice that you have to make in order to remain in your chosen industry.

[/spp-transcript]

Do you really think employers are trying to help you? You already know you can’t trust recruiters—they tell as they think you need to know to take the job they after representing so they collect their payday.

The skills needed to find a job are different yet complement the skills needed to do a job.

Jeff Altman, The Big Game Hunter has been a career coach and recruiter for what seems like one hundred years.

JobSearchCoachingHQ.com is there to change that with great advice for job hunters—videos, my books and guides to job hunting, podcasts, articles, PLUS a community for you to ask questions of PLUS the ability to ask me questions where I function as your ally with no conflict of interest answering your questions.

Connect with me on LinkedIn http://bit.ly/thebiggamehunter

Stop With the Superlatives!

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Jeff Altman, The Big Game Hunter encourages you to stop using superlatives to describe yourself in your resume and/or LinkedIn profile.

[spp-transcript]

I want to talk with you today about a certain peeve I have about resumes. This extends to LinkedIn profiles as well, but, I was reminded of it when I was interviewing someone for Job Search Radio last week who laid it out so beautifully.

When you read a resume or LinkedIn profile and the person describes themselves with superlatives of any kind (it doesn’t matter if there is one or 15; they are people who describe themselves with 15), when you describe yourself as a “visionary leader” with “extraordinary capabilities to enhance leadership ideas,”… No one believes you!

You just show yourself to be a fool. If anything, minimize your terms; being a minimalist when describing yourself is far more effective than these terms that are thought of as being BS. Why use the fluff when they do nothing to enhance the impression you give in people’s minds about you and instead caused them to think worse of you?

One of you done that was so visionary anyway? Let’s get practical about this. You’re going to be interviewed and they’re going to ask you, “What have you done this so visionary?”

What’s your answer? Nothing. You have nothing that is visionary in your portfolio. It was all BS, they knew it and called you on it.

So, cut the crap and get down to the brass tacks. Tell people what you know and what you’ve done. What you’ve succeeded in and how much money you help your firm make or save. Get the metrics in there (remember, if you work for a public company, you need to be careful with sharing some of that information to avoid revealing something proprietary or confidential).

[/spp-transcript]

Do you think employers are trying to help you? You already know you can’t trust recruiters—they tell as they think you need to know to take the job they after representing so they collect their payday.

The skills needed to find a job are different yet complement the skills needed to do a job.

Jeff Altman, The Big Game Hunter has been a career coach and recruiter for what seems like one hundred years.

JobSearchCoachingHQ.com is there to change that with great advice for job hunters—videos, my books and guides to job hunting, podcasts, articles, PLUS a community for you to ask questions of PLUS the ability to ask me questions where I function as your ally with no conflict of interest answering your questions.

Connect with me on LinkedIn

Think Gigs!– Job Search Radio

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word-cloud-with-gig-economy-related-tags-408639913             Listen to Think Gigs

 

From Uber and Lyft to FreeLancer and Upwork, the gig economy has taken off. For you as a worker, you may be coming to groups with those changes. On the first episode in Job Search Radio’s new format, Jeff Altman, The Big Game Hunter discusses the importance of facing gig work head on.

 

In returning from vacation, I decided to change the format of the show from one where I was finding people to interview to one where I share my advice and advice more freely than I was allowed to previously.

Every day, Monday through Friday, 5 to 6 minutes, 10 tops, you’ll be getting job search advice for me to help you find work more quickly.

This is the first show as I return and is not just simply design to help you earn additional income, but to head off any sort of difficulties you might have during the next recession. That’s because I believe the economic framework in the United States is changed… Let me make my case to you.

Think gigs.

And if you like today show, give it five stars in iTunes; given a great review; it’s can help other people discover the show.

If you have been paying attention, you’ve missed something that has been changing structurally in the US economy. That’s the change to part-time work that has become so prevalent.

If you take a look at the recovery (this isn’t a criticism of government policy or anyone politically), this is just an observation about how business has learned to cope with (1) the opportunities caused by changes in technology and (2) they’ll see the value in hiring full-time workers anymore.

What’s been happening more and more frequently is that companies are hiring part-time workers. That’s in the government statistics. Some of the gets buried in the notion of the U-6 report where the statistic talks about people who would like to work full time but are actually working part-time.

I question that a little bit now; part-time can be broken up into two categories. One is part-time workers; the second is the new gig economy. Free agents. Freelancers. People who are working whatever hours they need to in order to do a particular task.

Some might fall under the category of virtual assistants; some might be web designers who are working on an individual project. Writers, editors, a whole host of people. Recruiters. Coaches. People who are doing particular functions for specific people.

They are not working 40 hour work weeks. Some are working less; some are working more. Some may work 40 hours. They are self-employed individuals were part of this new gig economy.

What I expect is going to be happening with the next downturn is that this is going to be ingrained in the culture and ingrained in our society that much more.

If you think about it, if your business right now, you’re the headquarters building, you have buildings around the world where you are employing people. You are paying for benefits; you’re paying for that building; you’re paying for air conditioning and heat, for phone lines and computer systems… A variety of different additional things.

You are doing this even though you might need these people for a limited number of hours per week, a month or a year.

More and more firms, both small and large firms, and start to look at contractors, gig workers, people who are hired to perform a particular task. These people do it, are paid and move on.

You may complain, “Oh, it’s these people in India again, or in China or wherever.” But, you know, let me use myself as an example.

As I work on launching JobSearchCoachingHQ.com, I started looking at having some videos and the cost of having videos edited in the US was more than 10 times the cost of outsourcing it abroad. What would you do? You are buying close the made elsewhere. Don’t criticize me; you are doing the same thing except to do it with your clothes, your food and many other things.

That’s the trend I really see getting ingrained. Now, how does this affect you?

I want you to start thinking about things that you can do on the side or things that are part of your knowledge base that you can break apart that would create income for you in case the next recession, in case the next economic downturn or catastrophe affects you. Start now.

You can do research on sites like freelancer.com or upwork.com (that’s a successful company to elance.com and odesk.com) in any number of other sites where there is information and experiences with gig workers.

Thank you from the standpoint of what special skills you have that, if you were marketing yourself and your knowledge, how you would sell yourself on a contract basis.

So, for example, if you are an accountant, you might the tax returns. If you are an engineer, you might do design work for different people. If you are a programmer, you might write specifications or design documents.

What is it that you do that can be broken apart into component parts and marketed?

Go to the sites and just do it from the standpoint of research. Take some time to proactively think but don’t delay starting because gigs are going to be much more the norm in the future.

When I look at myself, my own background, and the work recruiters are doing, I am seeing more and more firms hiring contract recruiters, I am seeing sites that are paying for hourly work from recruiters. For example, there is one site I’ve seen where a recruiter sets the price (I have seen as low as $25 per hour in the US) for recruiting work. They are not paid a fee at the backend; they are hired to source, find and refer.

It’s happening everywhere, folks. You need to be ready for it. If you are an administrative assistant, obviously, you can do virtual assistant work.

Start thinking ahead. Start laying the foundation for doing work for others on a part-time basis NOW. That way, if the economy craters, if the recession hits, if you lose your job, you have the financial wherewithal to last until you find your next job. That may take longer than you think.

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Do you think employers are trying to help you? You already know you can’t trust recruiters—they tell as they think you need to know to take the job they after representing so they collect their payday.

The skills needed to find a job are different yet complement the skills needed to do a job.

Jeff Altman, The Big Game Hunter has been a career coach and recruiter for what seems like one hundred years.

JobSearchCoachingHQ.com is there to change that with great advice for job hunters—videos, my books and guides to job hunting, podcasts, articles, PLUS a community for you to ask questions of PLUS the ability to ask me questions where I function as your ally with no conflict of interest answering your questions.= http://www.JobSearchCoachingHQ.com

Connect with me on LinkedIn

Why Don’t Employers Ask for Letters of Recommendation?

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[svp]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GRKPxfX7_sA[/svp]
To me, there are good reasons why employers don’t want to read a letter of recommendation. However, I offer a suggestion for how you could create one that could be a very powerful advocate on your behalf.

[spp-transcript]

 

Do you really think employers are trying to help you? You already know you can’t trust recruiters—they tell as they think you need to know to take the job they after representing so they collect their payday.

The skills needed to find a job are different yet complement the skills needed to do a job.

Jeff Altman, The Big Game Hunter has been a career coach and recruiter for what seems like one hundred years.

JobSearchCoachingHQ.com is there to change that with great advice for job hunters—videos, my books and guides to job hunting, podcasts, articles, PLUS a community for you to ask questions of PLUS the ability to ask me questions where I function as your ally with no conflict of interest answering your questions.

Connect with me on LinkedIn http://bit.ly/thebiggamehunter

The Two Doors Brainteaser

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Jeff Altman, The. Big Game Hunter offers an answer to the classic brainteaser. “You have two doors  and two people that you can ask questions of. One always tells the truth.  One always lies. You can only ask one question of one of the people. What’s the question you ask?

[spp-transcript]

I have one of those hedge fund brainteaser questions for today – – the two doors brainteaser.Here’s how it goes.

There are two doors. Behind one door is a job offer. Behind the other door is all the pain and suffering in the world. There are two people outside them. One is someone who always tells the truth; one is someone who always lies. You can only ask one question of one of them. What is the question you should ask to figure out what door it is that has the job behind it?

So what you do is pick one of the guys and ask, “what with the other guy say is the correct door to go to?”

If the other person is the liar, he would tell you the wrong door. If he is the truth teller he’s going to tell you the correct door.

If the person you asked the question of is the honest one, he will point you to the wrong door (after all, he’s talking about the liar). If that person is the liar, your point you to the wrong door.

When you evaluate the choices, whatever door they pointed to, choose the opposite one.

[/spp-transcript]

Do you think employers are trying to help you? You already know you can’t trust recruite

rs—they tell as they think you need to know to take the job they after representing so they collect their payday.

The skills needed to find a job are different yet complement the skills needed to do a job.

Jeff Altman, The Big Game Hunter has been a career coach and recruiter for what seems like one hundred years.

JobSearchCoachingHQ.com is there to change that with great advice for job hunters—videos, my books and guides to job hunting, podcasts, articles, PLUS a community for you to ask questions of PLUS the ability to ask me questions where I function as your ally with no conflict of interest answering your questions.

Connect with me on LinkedIn

Is There Any Way to Write a Cover Letter Without It Sounding Cliched? (VIDEO)

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[svp]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l5OSU0VR048[/svp]
Cover letters can be so boring. How can I actually write a cover letter that doesn’t sound like one big cliché? Here, I offer all way to do that and two ways to submit to an employer.

[spp-transcript]

Is there any way to write a cover letter without it sounding clichéd?

Hell yeah!

The clichéd ones are so boring and so awful.

I’m forwarding my resume to you for the position I saw advertised on (fill in the blank). I believe my experience with such and such and such and such makes me an ideal individual for the role.

Who cares what you think, especially when your resume is little more than spam. You’ve submitted a resume that in no way, shape or form demonstrates a fit for the role you’ve applied for.

I want to break this question into two parts.

Number one is cover letters are a bit anachronistic. Think in terms of the body of your email. If you are uploading it to an applicant tracking system, think of page one of the resume as being the cover letter.

So what will this cover letter do?

It will demonstrate a fit for the role as you understand it to be. So, if you have seen an ad, it is easiest because what you do is create was called “a T letter.” I created this idea years ago before it was named but it makes perfect sense as described this way.

Let me start with the first sentence.

I’m forwarding this resume to you based on the recommendation Jeff Altman. Jeff told me that you are looking for someone for a role . . . and you describe a couple of things that they are looking for. I want to make my fit for this role apparent to you, so let me outline my background as is relevant.

Now, in the left-hand column, you put the experiences you understand them to be. if you have job it like I said is easiest of all because you use the qualifications that they’ve listed there, the requirements of the position and perhaps the pluses that you have, as well as the the responsibilities of the role. In the right-hand column, next you’re going to put what what you’ve done and for how long and how recently you did it.

Do it this way because there is less interest in things that you did when Bill Clinton was president. then there are now. The more current stuff is always more relevant If it’s older, it tends to be less desirable). You need to be open about this and save yourself themselves them some time.

So in the right-hand column, you put down the skill involved. ln the left-hand column, you put down how long, how recently and what you have done briefly.

So let’s say there are 15 things there, that’s the equivalent of the cover letter.

So if it’s in the body of an email because you are emailing it, this is the perfect way to do it.

If you are doing it and submitting your resume and cover letter through an ATS system, then you are making this page one of the resume that you are uploading to the system.

The system will parse it, fill in a number of fields, and, after you’ve done this, you finish up by saying “I hope to hear from you soon. If I don’t, I’ll give you call in a few days to follow up.

That’s it. That’s not boring to an employer because that’s what you are doing is demonstrating how you fit the role and making it obvious to them, as opposed to having people have to sit there and “read tea leaves” to figure it out.

That’s how to NOT make it clichéd … by demonstrating your fit for the role.[/spp-transcript]

 

 

Do you really think employers are trying to help you? You already know you can’t trust recruiters—they tell as they think you need to know to take the job they after representing so they collect their payday.

The skills needed to find a job are different yet complement the skills needed to do a job.

Jeff Altman, The Big Game Hunter has been a career coach and recruiter for what seems like one hundred years.

JobSearchCoachingHQ.com is there to change that with great advice for job hunters—videos, my books and guides to job hunting, podcasts, articles, PLUS a community for you to ask questions of PLUS the ability to ask me questions where I function as your ally with no conflict of interest answering your questions.

Connect with me on LinkedIn http://bit.ly/thebiggamehunter

Why Are You Putting Up With It?

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Jeff Altman, The Big Game Hunter draws from his own experience to talk about the decision to change jobs.

[spp-transcript]

I want to talk with you about the decision to change jobs and draw upon my own experience. On two occasions in my career, I was working for organizations for 10 years or more. I was clearly entrenched in these organizations, very comfortable despite some of the nonsense that existed there.

We all know every organization has nonsense – – people of personalities, they have moods. You live with them for a long period of time and some of those times of frustrating.

In the most recent instance, I was associated with the firm for more than a dozen years and no matter what I did, the matter what I said, there was a lengthy period of time I was hitting my head against the wall in frustration. Still the idea of changing jobs didn’t come to mind.

It one more instance (the details aren’t important) for my wife to interrupt me one day and ask, “Have you thought about changing jobs at all?” Ultimately, I decided to start my own firm

Sometimes, you just have to listen to what someone else tells you or ask you and pause and ask yourself a question, “Why not?” What’s keeping you there? What’s so good about this situation that you want to go through all the frustration you go through?

I’ve been in sales for a long time and much of my income comes from commission. For those of you were not in sales, is it worth the salary that you are getting to experience all the frustration that you’re going through?

Why are you accepting this? Who are you trying to please in all of this?

When all is said and done, ultimately, let them make the right decision for yourself. However, if you are noticing that there are more days than not when you are referring to things that can best be described as “nonsense,” when no matter how are in Africa making success is not available to you, sometimes that’s because the market that you’re serving, sometimes that’s because the systems that your operating (i.e. the company rules and regulations that get in the way of you obtaining the success that you want), why are you putting up with it?

My encouragement to you is to stop for a second and think or have an ally available because (like in my case, my wife) who, in a very simple way, asked “Have you thought about changing jobs yet?”

Then, think about it. Why not? Why not change jobs? Why tolerate the mediocrity of your current situation, your lack of contentment and happiness that comes with your current role?

[/spp-transcript]

Do you think employers are trying to help you? You already know you can’t trust recruiters—they tell as they think you need to know to take the job they after representing so they collect their payday.

The skills needed to find a job are different yet complement the skills needed to do a job.

Jeff Altman, The Big Game Hunter has been a career coach and recruiter for what seems like one hundred years.

JobSearchCoachingHQ.com is there to change that with great advice for job hunters—videos, my books and guides to job hunting, podcasts, articles, PLUS a community for you to ask questions of PLUS the ability to ask me questions where I function as your ally with no conflict of interest answering your questions.

Connect with me on LinkedIn

One Mile South, One Mile East, One Mile North and Are Back in the Same Place

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[svp]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eccjN11A2xA[/svp]
How many points are there on the earth where you could travel one mile south, then one mile east, then one mile north and end up in the same spot you started?

[spp-transcript]

Here’s a fun brainteaser question for today!

So the question is, “How many points are there on earth where you can travel 1 mile south, then 1 mile east, then 1 mile north and end up in the same spot you started in?”

Got that?

This is a fun one because I think most people start off with the answer of the North Pole. Think of the earth as being a sphere.You can start at the North Pole and can travel 1 mile south then 1 mile east then 1 mile north on the back of the North Pole, right?

But there’s another group of places that it could also work.

So imagine being at the South Pole or at a place near the South Pole where you could travel around the earth and it would be only 1 mile to travel around it.

So you could start 1 mile north of that point and then travel 1 mile south, 1 mile east and then 1 mile north and wind up in the same place you started.

The trick with that is this infinite number of places that that could work because there is not what one finite spot where this is true. Remember we’re dealing with a sphere. You could be any one of those points 1 mile north of that circumference of the earth and wind up being able to do this.

And within that of 1 mile circumference, let’s go to a half-mile. So if you started a mile north of that point; you can travel 1 mile south to it and then walk around the earth twice and then head back to the north and wind up in the same spot, right?

And again the same thing is true. There is an infinite number of possibilities where that could happen. Frankly it’s also true of any place within the radius of a mile around or any spot within that circumference this answer can work.

So, the answer was really the North Pole with an infinite number of choices that will allow you to do this.

[/spp-transcript]

 

 

Fun Question!

Do you really think employers are trying to help you? You already know you can’t trust recruiters—they tell as they think you need to know to take the job they after representing so they collect their payday.

The skills needed to find a job are different yet complement the skills needed to do a job.

Jeff Altman, The Big Game Hunter has been a career coach and recruiter for what seems like one hundred years.

JobSearchCoachingHQ.com is there to change that with great advice for job hunters—videos, my books and guides to job hunting, podcasts, articles, PLUS a community for you to ask questions of PLUS the ability to ask me questions where I function as your ally with no conflict of interest answering your questions.

Connect with me on LinkedIn http://bit.ly/thebiggamehunter